Chapters Chapter two: The digital shadow
Aiden Pearce looked down at the screen in his hand, gazing at the icon.
He didn't like change.
Change was the bane of his existence. When the light changed, shadows grew to hide his enemies or shrunk to reveal him. When the direction the target was facing changed, it ruined the plan he'd concocted, saving their hides for another brief second and putting Pearce in danger for another second longer. When his mood changed, it affected his performance. When his surroundings changed, his enemies felt comfortable in their home turf, while he was left guessing.
As he had been. For the last month.
Aiden didn't like being in the middle of change unless it was to his advantage, and unless he'd conducted the change himself, this wasn't likely to happen. He especially disliked it when there was more than one change, when too many things changed at once to keep track of. This newest change then, was a particular sore spot for him.
Let's start from the beginning.
Aiden Pearce considered himself to be a hard man to shock in anyway. His guard was only down when he slept, his gazed never failed to go over his shoulder every twenty seconds and he was a capable man anyway, his reactions somewhat of an urban legend where he came from. However, even the vigilante had to admit, this had thrown his game for a while.
Ponies.
Talking, ponies.
Pastel coloured, talking, ponies.
He hadn't been sure what to expect when he'd woken up after what seemed to have been a normal night. One convoy taken down, three muggings interrupted and a gang hideout taken down, all in around nine hours. Sleep at six in the morning and up at nine at night again the next evening. But the hideout he'd re-fashioned as his base of operations had been in an alleyway in the Loop, right under ctOS's nose. Not, in the forest he'd woken up in.
A change. A huge change, a catastrophic change. He was on the outskirts of a small forest, a village of sorts about half a mile away. A village of ponies. Ponies, of all things. Pastel coloured, talking ponies, some complete with wings, others with horns on their heads. All of them going about like nothing.
A quick retreat had been called for, back to his hideout. To think, to plan, to observe. He didn't know what had happened, nor why, nor how and he didn't much care. All's he cared about, was that is that it had happened. He'd set up traps, cameras, defences, everything to make sure his paranoia was not well-deserved. He didn't know this place, and he hadn't liked it.
Then, he'd come to his senses.
He'd calmed, stopped trying to think things through and just acted. Mental fortitude and discipline had kept him on the straight, narrow and sane for this long. They would not fail him now.
In under a day, he'd found himself in a new place, almost panicked, re-commanded his senses and then taken the necessary steps to survive here. He'd missed the computer course that explained to him how to survive in the wild, but he didn't need it. He kept enough military grade rations in these container to last him years. Weaponry was no problem; all of his accumulative arms were stored in the locker in here, alongside more than enough ammunition. Chemicals, electronic parts, pills and all other components to his ordinance and drugs were here in plentiful numbers too. All's he needed now were his hacks.
First had been the Profiler. Useless here, as it was; ctOS apparently didn't have a branch here, so he'd had to improvise. He broken into the public offices under cover of night, stolen his way into the records. He'd been surprised with the results.
Magic, was the only word for it. It was no science nor technology he knew of, and he wasn't going through a Digital Trip again, so that was all he could put it down to. Magic. Magic defences on the buildings, magically powered lighting, magic backups to the records on the local populace. And a whole lot of backdoors.
It had amazed him at first, when he'd instinctively tapped the lock/unlock icon on the phone, frowning to himself for his stupidity, only for the sound cue for 'invalid command, please try another' to sound. He'd looked down at the phone in confusion. It should have remained silent, there were no commands available to hack into so there were no invalid commands. That's what he'd thought. He'd pulled back again, the Profiler taking a backseat to figuring out this glitch in his software. It had taken him two days to figure out.
All the ponies here had magic, yes. He'd seen it, amazed and confused at first, worried and paranoid second, but he'd been able to deduce it as something like this; the ponies with horns, he'd called them Unicorns for simplicity's sake, were capable of actively using magic. Examples he'd seen so far were telekinetic powers and illumination for the most part, but he got the feeling there were others. The winged ponies, the Pegasus he'd heard one say, could fly, likely using magic to hold themselves up or, at least, for their ability to walk on clouds. The ponies with nothing, regulars he'd named them, were more basic, except for their slightly impossible strength. It had to be. Their muscles weren't big enough to do the things they did.
But there was something interesting about how they used their magic. The regular and Pegasus ponies seemed to have a natural affinity to use their powers, but the unicorns had to learn. He guessed they accessed it through their horns, as they seemed to glow when using spells, but he'd been able to deduce that to use specific spells, they aligned their own magical energy to the exact frequency of the desired spell.
How did he know this? Well, put simply, he'd been able to hack into it.
Such an amazing and fascinating ability, to use magic, but horrible and terrifying when out of your control. These had been Pearce's thoughts when he'd first discovered the use of magic. And it would be these ponies' thoughts when he used it against them.
It had been experimentation first, seeing what did what. He'd learned that lower frequencies tended to yield active spells, telekinesis and so forth, while high created passive magic, spells he could see in use but he could perceive in use, such as when the sun went up.
Yes, that had been something, to learn that the disturbances in his tests and dawn and dusk had been the sun and moon going up or down. That had done something to him nothing had done in a long time. It had made him smile. If he could figure out the correct frequency, he could, in theory, drop the sun out of the sky. He'd love to read the newspaper article on that.
He'd quickly moved on to other experiments, as to not get ahead of himself. Further field research had yielded more results, such as the existence of enchantments that had a variety of effects on the environment. He'd looked into the most common enchantments in the village, most of them taking the form of steam ventilation safety valves or power sources for what passed for technology here.
One of the later things he'd discovered was the existence of trains here. They used steam engines, but the brakes, lighting, the links between the trains and anything 'electronic' was all powered by magic. Yet another weakness. In fact, everything that he assosaited with technology was powered by magical energies, all using a simple 'on/off' frequency setting.
It had all been highly successful, only impossible to use in a chase or escape. Then he'd had the idea of using pre-programed apps for different frequencies, in essence, replacing his old ctOS hacks with the disrupter hacks. He'd made notes and kept records of everything he'd discovered in hopes of expending upon his already impressive arsenal. The only problem was that he had to limit his number of hacks in quick succession; blowing the steam valves was simple enough, but things like throwing the magical power for a whole block could get his personal frequency recognised and he'd be hunted down on the spot if he used another demanding hack like that right after. It all made it very tricky, but he'd managed to calculate what he could and couldn't hack and used the battery symbol he'd used before to tell him what he could hack back in Chicago safely before the ctOS firewall locked him out.
However, that all paled in comparison with the new optimised Profiler. After a second attempt at breaking into the record halls, he'd downloaded the magic backups. It made little sense to him at first, what a 'magical backup' might be, until he'd figured out that it was more or less the same as a USB, only in scroll form. Indestructible parchment and enchanted ink allowed for anyone to look up anyone's, or anyponies' as he'd later discovered, personal information from the one scroll in the form of magical frequencies.
Once he'd returned to the container and uploaded all the data from his phone, he'd been both impressed and concerned at the level of intelligence on the citizens of 'Ponyville.' Things like age, names, date of birth, something called a 'cutie mark', occupations, salary, criminal records and that sort of thing had been what Aiden had expected. But these went much further, further maybe than the ctOS network went. Daily habits, general weekly schedules, personal affiliations and so on had been included. All that, however, was nothing in comparison to the 'restricted documents.' This was apparently high level information that only the royal family was supposed to access, alongside a few of the higher ranking military officials. It gauged what they'd done with their lives and calculated what they were most likely to do.
It worked in the same way as the ctOS crime prediction system; look at their records for anything that may affect their outward behaviour or things they were likely to repeat for whatever reason or just ponies who were likely to act out and mark them down for surveillance.
It had given Aiden troubled thoughts: either the pers-pony in charge here was either very distrustful of his citizens, he was very thorough a his job or he was one paranoid S.O.B. Given the lack of technological convenience, Pearce could only guess that this place had a magical equivalent of the ctOS network, or some very strange public questioners. Either way, he was impressed with it, and determined to use it for as much good as he could. A somewhat complex facial pattern recognising software program in use alongside the information he'd stole, and Aiden Pearce, the vigilante, was back in action.
He went back out onto the streets, moving away from the village of Ponyville to places with more crime, given that after a week here he hadn't heard of so much as a dollar being picked up and not returned. That was another problem too, actually. He had no way of syphoning funds from these ponies. Of course, he doubted they would have any kind of digital banking anyway, not to mention they seemed to use metal coins called 'bits' as their standard currency here. It didn't bother him much. He doubted the banks here were that well protected.
That had all been about three weeks ago. Now, he was here, some kind of sprawling city-scape, as expansive as the Loop but as deep and with as many nooks and crannies as Chicago as a whole. He'd managed to find out the place was called 'Canterlot' once he'd raided the records of the place, and he'd found it to be about as bad for crime as Chicago had. He'd decided to set up here, wishing only that he could get the container he'd been living in over here somehow.
He was stood on a low rooftop, away from wandering eyes, his gaze down on the icon on the screen. He waited for a name, for a face, one of these 'cutie mark' things to throw up a red light. Then it did.
Name: Stone Trek
Recently injured back
Occupation: Professional rock-climber
Salary: 9, 897
Aiden hit the icon: crime prediction. It showed him as a 60% victim. It made sense; he walked, or trotted, with obvious pain and he earned enough to make him an easy target for a lowly thug to pick off for a quick buck. Or bit.
Aiden calmly strode to the side of the building, watching the laid-off climber trot down an alleyway. The Profiler showed he lived nearby, so he was likely taking a regular shortcut. Another advantage of the hacker's latest profiler was that he could access further information than what the original offered without risk of detection, since it was already uploaded on his computer. All's he had to do was get a match, and he was golden, not to mention safe from any security risks.
Looking back down at his marked victim, Aiden hopped down onto a lower portion of the roof before dropping to street-level. He dropped to a crouch, his right hand slipping into his coat to draw the 1911 he kept in there. He reached in again and pulled out the silencer from the small, tube-like holster he kept beneath it, twisting it onto the barrel as he followed Stone Trek. He dropped back when another pony leapt into view.
"Alright, you know what this is! Hoof it over" he yelled, a knife at Stone's neck. There was a stunned silence for two seconds, Stone likely attempting to comply but it was suddenly unnecessary.
The mugger's eyes latched to the tall, looming figure emerging from the shadows, his fore-legs raised and holding a strange piece of metal. Before he could do anything, the thing had spoken.
"You may want to reconsider that." The mugger quickly felt his nerve drain away as he turned away and bolted down the alleyway. The thing took after him, he could hear its heavy hoof-steps. It was gaining, he could tell; he looked back to find it closer than before, much closer than when he'd started galloping. Looking back down the alleyway, he saw a chain-link fence and jumped up it, his powerful earth-pony muscles propelling him up half its length before he hoisted himself over. He kept galloping. Looking back, he sae the thing hadn't faltered; he leapt at a trash can, planting on of his weird hind-hooves on it before he launched himself over, his fore-hooves holding himself up as he sailed over gracefully.
As he dropped down the other side, something in its fore-hoof glowed.
There was a bang, blinding smoke and scalding heat for a second, the mugger thrown off balance as he fell to his stomach, scrambling to his hooves again. He tried to get up only for the thing to pounce of him. He heard a strange 'clickclickclick' sound and then the world was replaced by pain, something beaten over his head a few times before he couldn't move thanks to the pain. The thing got off of him and he heard it trot away calmly.
Aiden didn't look back at the mugger. A simple chance and another cocky thug. He clambered up a fire-escape on the side of a building, disappearing from view as he left the limited light that found its way into the ally below, clambering back onto the roves again as he looked out over Canterlot.
"One down" he mumbled to himself. Aiden looked down at the Profiler in his hand, finding it picking up another hit. He grunted. "Too many more to go."
Chapter three: Fox hunt
Aiden stood atop his vantage, watching the goings on from above. He rarely ventured out in the daylight to conduct business such as this, but this latest development had caught his interest.
Let's start from the beginning.
The past few days had been as rotary as they could get for the Fox; vigilantism could hardly be called a boring vocation, but things had been quiet these last days. A good sign, in Pearce's mind, but it also sparked his inevitable paranoia; if things were quiet, did that mean that the criminals here were easier to scare than back in Chicago, or was there something going on underneath it all.
Take one guess which option he'd gone with.
The whole of the past few days had been spent patrolling, stalking the rooftops like the shadow he was. No convoys, no vulnerable hideouts, not even any muggings. Perfect silence. Today, however, he'd been woken up a few hours before scheduled by a light trilling that informed him of a hit on the Profiler; the ctOS-esc scanning program had picked up three individuals with a history of violence all moving past the building he'd been camped atop of, away from the prying eyes of the ponies below. It was evening, the bronze glow of the sun signalling that the end of the day was fast approaching, and these ponies seemed to be taking advantage of it.
He'd followed them, waiting for what was mathematically probable to happen today to happen; he'd watched them trot into a bank, and not three minutes later alarms had started blaring, ponies had started galloping for their lives and the gold-plated guards had shown up, spears at the ready. Pearce had set up too, pulling the small, laptop-sized bag from his satchel and putting together the sniper rifle in there.
Now, he was on his stomach, watching the goings on through the scope of the rifle. He was listening in to the negotiations below, picking out shouted words from the stallions; 'hostages', 'no escape' and 'not afraid to die' were the key phrases Aiden picked up on. Suicidal bank robbers with hostages only made the equation of 'battle' in the vigilante's mind. Innocent ponies would die. He needed to get in there and stop them before things got out of control. He looked up from the scope, getting an angle of his surroundings and made a simple plan. He looked back down the scope and spied the spokes-pony of the thugs, blaring out demands and threats. Aiden didn't listen to his words as much as he didn't listen to his screams as a chunk of his leg was taken by the high-calibre bullet that fired from the silenced rifle.
It was confusion for a second. The guards all lunged for cover, their spears or swords held in offence as the civilians galloped for their lives. None of them noticed the bipedal shape leap between two buildings, run across the roof of the second before dropped to the ground and opened on of the windows with a magic they didn't understand.
Inside, there was a tense calm. Aiden dropped to a crouch, moving within the shadows cast by the setting sun. He was in a filing room of some sort, draws four shelves high packed with pieces of paper that recorded just how wealthy or poor the inhabitants of this place were. He wondered for a second just how useful this could all be to him, before he shook the thought away.
'Another day, Pearce.'
He stalked forward, his phone hidden in his coat to reduce lighting, and made his way to the door. It was unopened but not locked, so he eased it open and stepped into the hall beyond. He could hear voiced coming from his right, likely the robbers arguing over what to do. He frowned. He counted five voices, which meant either the hostages were involved or they had already had ponies planted inside. He moved forward, taking his time to step lightly, and soon came to an alcove, forming so useful cover either side of the arching doorway. He hid in the shadows, his coat, hat and face-concealing scarf hiding him in the gloom. It dawned on him in that moment just how redundant covering his face was here.
There were definitely four robbers here, confirming his prior suspicions of planted goons. They were dressed in raggedy hoodies, bandanas concealing their faces, a bat, sword or knife in their grips as they meandered around. It was almost though provoking, just how similar the criminal were here when compared to back home.
He shook the though away, keeping his mind on the job. They were mainly regular ponies, the one outside without wing nor horn, while the four in here were two regulars, a Unicorn and a Pegasus. Beyond them were around fourteen cowering hostages, all sat in a neat row against the far wall. Easy to control and out of the way. Perfect.
Pearce wasted no more time. The lights were on, any access point from outside was closed, asides the one their shot ally had gone through, and they were all busy bickering over whether to make an escape, stand their ground or surrender. Pearce decided to alleviate the decision from them.
He tapped an icon. The lights went out. The four thugs cried out in shock, looking to the ceiling. One had cried 'what's going on' while the others just looked scared in the dim light. They heard the sound of muffled step heading towards them, a 'clickclickclick' sound following it. Right after, the Unicorn felt a blinding pain on the back of his head, a grunt and a scream mixing together as he felt to his front, another burst of pain rocking his system as he fell unconscious.
Then, the lightly flickered back to life terrifying the thugs and bugging their mystery assaulter somewhat. They all looked to their downed friend and looked at what had downed him. Then they screamed. They all made moves to try and get away, the Pegasus flapping his wings while the regulars turned and galloped.
There was a weird noise and then the Pegasus couldn't hold himself up anymore, falling to the ground with a thud and the dull crack of a metal object meeting the back of his skull. The other two ponies turned to find him pursuing them; the thing lunged for one, tackling him to the ground and beating him senseless while the other went deeper into the bank.
Pearce looked up to find the last thug galloping around a corner, leaving his friends to his mercy. He looked slowly to his left, finding the hostages all cowering away from him. He simply straightened up and collapsed the baton against his leg before marching after the escaped thug. As he went, he activated the security measures behind him, closing and locking the security door to the foyer from the halls towards the back of the bank. He then took a second to hack directly into the lighting and overloaded the fuses, shutting them off for good.
He sunk into a crouch again. Pearce stalked forward, as silent as ever, and hunted his prey. His eyes quickly adjusted to the low lighting, dim outlines made apparent with it, and he made his way forward. He could hear the sound of the panicked and scared thug, cowering somewhere ahead of him, and he towards the sound. He looked left and right when he came to a cross junction in the halls.
He didn't have time to think before a dark shape lunged at him with a nary a grunt. Pearce quickly raised his arms to defend himself, but he was already on the ground and the knife to his neck.
"By order of Celestia, you are under arrest." Aiden raised an eyebrow. A trap? Light suddenly flooded the hallway they were both in, Aiden looking around to find Unicorns, Pegasi and regulars galloping towards them with their horns aglow, weapons raised. None of them said anything as they surrounded him, their armour not clanking or groaning; they wore black armour of fear-inducing angles and proportions, weapons of complementing styles in their glows or hooves. Once they were close, every weapon and horn was aimed at him.
The guard let him up, his knife still to Aiden's throat.
"Come quietly, and we can do this the easy way" the guard told him. Aiden looked him in the eye; he let the guard looking at the narrow space between his hat and scarf watch his narrowing eyes, but before the guard could react to him his knee had already shot into his groin.
Under the light of the guards around him, Aiden sprang to his feet, his hand whipping to his coat pocket and gripping the baton there; his hand whipped to the side, the telescopic baton extending. Before any of the guards could react, he had beaten the pommel into the guard's temple, putting him out, and turned to the others.
With a baton in his right and his phone in the left, Aiden Pearce took the fight to a small platoon of guards.
They held their ground and advanced with strategy and caution, but none of them could match the creature's speed. Before they could act, his claw-like appendage had moved around the glow and the Unicorns all felt a painful contraction around in their horns and foreheads, stunning them and cutting off their illumination charm.
In the dark once more, Aiden moved forward, on the attack. He swung the baton in the direction of the guards to his left, feeling it connect with a pony's skull. He moved again, swinging it back and feeling it hit another across the jowl. Another step to the right and he brought it down on the top of another's skull by the tip, sending the guard's chin into his chest and his body to the floor.
By the time his third foe had fallen, the guards had managed to react and had returned his attack. Light flared around them once again, illuminating the creature as his weapon swung into the horn of one of the Unicorns amongst them, cutting off his glow and throwing him into his allies behind. The creature spun again, beating the baton across another guard as the rest lunged for him. The fight quickly devolved into a scrap on the floor, grunts, shouts, curses and the sounds of ponies in pain.
On the floor, covered in ponies dressed in metal, Aiden was hardly having fun. He struck out with fist and weapon, breaking the ponies limbs where he could, his legs and knees meeting the ribs and groins of no few of the guards. He wasn't used to such long melee fights, quick takedowns were more his forte, but he knew how to handle himself. But he also knew that against so many opponents, he hadn't a chance if he couldn't find an edge. He struggled and fought, elbows, fists, arms and legs all landing in the joints, ribs and faces of the guards piling on top of him. It was starting to get hard to breath under all this weight. This wasn't good, but he had to escape, at least stand up. With a fist breaking a guard's jaw and a forehead into another's muzzle, he managed to get his boots under the guard on top of him, a big bastard if Aiden had ever seen one, and pushed with all his might. Years of running and fighting had left Aiden with strong muscles, but this guy still made him work. Yet, with a burst of adrenalin, he heaved the pony off of him and managed to scramble to his feet.
He took off.
Aiden shot down the hallway he and the first guard had come down, feeling a trickle of blood run down his forehead from beneath his cap and a dull soreness developing in his back, gut and right leg. He had to escape, rest and heal, and he couldn't do that with an army of guards on his tail. He tapped the lock/unlock icon on the screen on his phone, the security door ahead 'clunking' open as he barrelled through. He was met with more guards.
He vaguely recognised the 'hostages' from before, stallions and mares all dressed impromptu in their armour, sheaths that were empty hanging from their belts while the stared down the vigilante. Aiden cracked his neck left and right, tightened his grip on his baton and tapped another icon on his phone. He lights went out for a fourth time, only to flicker back on as the Unicorns amongst the guards flared their horns in light, but Aiden had already acted. His right arm was raised, a contraption in his hand that the ponies didn't recognise. He pulled the trigger, there was a flash and a sharp bang and one of the guards fell with a scream, clutching her fore-leg.
The guards all turned to their fallen comrade, finding the mare writing on the floor, clutching her wounded leg. Before they realised what was happening, they heard yet another short-lived bang and heard a window smash to their left. They looked back to the creature only to find him galloping for the cracked window and leaping out. They all galloped over and followed him out. He'd gone into a dead-end alley, so they followed it to its exit, coming out in the main street that the bank was on. There were guards everywhere, Princess Luna herself conducting the trap, but no creature. Luna spotted them before long, frowning at them as they cantered towards her.
"What happened? The vigilante" she demanded. A higher ranking guard spoke up.
"No ma'am, but we found…something else in there" he answered.
"Found what" Luna requested shortly. She didn't want her time wasted with this. The guard looked back at his comrades for support, not exactly in the best of confidence around the Princess of the night, but none of them had a better idea than him.
"Well, I don't know. It was about as tall as Princess Celestia but stood on its hind legs. It also did something to the lighting and private Hay in the foyer" he reported "we were-"
"Did what to her?" The guard frowned again.
"It seemed to shoot fire or something from its hoof, or claw, and something hit her in the leg." Luna looked to the bank and trotted towards it, the guards towing behind.
"This thing, what did it look like?" The guard looked at his comrades again before he answered.
"Well, I think it was wearing clothing, it seemed intelligent and had this strange glow around on its hoof, or claw." Luna turned her head back slightly.
"It used magic?"
"I'm not sure, I sure acted like magic but it was no Unicorn magic I've ever seen" he answered. Luna nodded and flung the main doors to the bank open with her magic. Golden Hay was lying in a pool of her own blood, clutching her fore-leg with a pained expression on her face as the other guards attempted to see to her.
"Private Hay" she called into the mass of guards. The mare groaned a little, the rest of the guards moving aside for Luna. She cantered towards the downed guard and crouched besides her. "What happened to you" she asked, trying to be a little more gentle with the wounded guard.
"I-I'm not sure. It just-ah-did something to my leg. I can still feel it in there" she hissed through her pain. Luna frowned and let her horn glow; a few strangled cries escaped the mare as Luna gripped the foreign object in the mare's leg and wrenched it out with a small spatter of blood before she closed the wound with her magic, a soft sizzling and the smell of burning flesh escaping the mare's leg as she writhed in quiet pain on the floor, tears welling in her eyes.
Meanwhile, Luna held the object to the light and frowned again. A small piece of lead. Her eyes snapped open as she made the connection, her head whipping over to the guard who had reported to her.
"Guard, where did you last see this creature." The guard blinked.
"Uh, we were chasing it out of the bank; it went through that window and into the alley but it disappeared." Luna whipped her head towards the window and found the alley the guards had trotted out of. She cantered over to it and found it to be a dead end.
"You fool" she spat at the guard "this is a dead end, it could still be here" she shouted, the guard snarling at her back as she stepped through the broken glass and let her horn's glow drop the piece of lead and focus into a torch-like beam. She shone it through the gloom, finding nothing but over turned trash cans and muck. With a growl she cantered back out into the street, the guards watching her in confusion as she checked the roof tops around the area.
This plan had first been put into place to finally capture the vigilante, Celestia having decided to stop his criminal activities, no matter how useful they were. Luna had suggested the trap, to draw him out, but this latest development put a whole new spin on things. Her eyes caught a shape atop a building, watching the proceedings. She stared for a second before it turned away, prompting Luna to growl as her suspicions influenced her and she took off, flapping her wings a few times before she landed on the roof. The sun was almost over the horizon now, her moon scheduled to come over the horizon as it left, but right now her mind was set on this bronze and shadow coloured rooftop.
"Where are you" she called into the gloom cast by the doorway in the middle of the roof, the ventilation systems and the billboard atop the side of the building. She got no answer for a while, only silence. And the sound of another's breathing. "Come out, I know you're there" she called again, her eyes casting over the darkness.
"I'm not your enemy" came a low, grizzled voice. Luna searched through the gloom in the direction the voice had come from.
"Prove it" she spoke back "come quietly." There was a shift in the darkness as something stepped out. Luna couldn't hold back her frown. It was a biped of some sort, but it was no dragon or Diamond dog, it was nothing she'd ever seen. She was beginning to understand the vague descriptions of the witnesses. It seemed to be wearing a large coat that covered its body, a baseball cap and a scarf that covered its face. Its fore-leg-esc limbs lead into pockets while its eyes glared at her.
"Not going to happen" it answered. Luna glared back.
"I'm afraid I can't allow that; you've killed and maimed no less than fifty ponies." The biped grunted.
"All of them scum" it replied. Luna cocked her head.
"So, you are the vigilante. The Fox." The biped cocked its own head.
"I am." Luna grinned and spread her wings, her horn glowing as she held herself offensively.
"Well then, Fox, you've just met your hunter." Luna darted forward, only for a small explosion to her left to knock her off course. She over shot the Fox, the biped neatly sidestepping her, and she crashed headfirst into a wall. Holding her head and growling, Luna looked up to find the Fox stepping onto the roof proper, its limbs leaving its pockets and letting what looked like a baton extend. She stood with a grin. "So, a fighter are we?" The Fox didn't answer, only stand still with its baton in one hand and a strange glow in the other. Luna stood and stalked forward.
She darted forward, her hoof aimed at the Fox. He ducked back and retaliated with the baton in its grip; the pommel knocked into her horn, at the base, and she quickly stumbled back with another pained growl. This thing knew ponies weak points. She charged her horn for a second and let a powerful beam fire at it. The Fox rolled to the side quickly, its left limb's claws doing something in the glow of its hand. She tried for another spell only to fell a sharp pain in her horn. She couldn't get her magic to her horn, the feeling was all wrong. What had this thing done to her? In the midst of her pain, the Fox had stepped in and its baton came down on her heat again. A blinding pain rocked her system, Luna's head going down, another heavy jolt of pain flared through her system as the baton met her jaw, stunning her. Before she knew what was happening, Luna felt a dull pain on her chest and was falling from the roof.
She instinctively spread her wings, only to gain no flight. Then she started screaming. After six floors screaming and eight of falling, Luna hit the concrete with a terrible 'thwak' leading with her shoulder. Luna heard more than felt her shoulder bone crumbled under the force of the fall, her screaming turning to a squeal for a single second before she pushed the pain down to just grunts. The guards that had been gathered around the building, but loath to interrupt their Princess, all rushed to her aid only for her to wave them away with her good hoof before it went back to her injured leg.
"Get after him" she barked, watching the Fox move away from the edge of the roof as he watched her "this fight isn't other" she seethed to herself.
Frequencies
Chapter one: A sense of foreboding
Celestia looked down at the report on her desk, reading through this latest crime. Or could it be called a crime?
Let's start from the beginning.
Princess Celestia's life was divided into three major segments: her personal life, in which only she had a say. Her social life, which revolved mainly around her sister, princess Luna, her niece, princess Cadence, and her student, Twilight Sparkle, alongside the ruler's few friends. Finally, there was the princess's political life, which revolved around her beloved country, Equestria.
Out of the three branches of her life, her political life and dealings were often the most logical based; she used her mind in dealings, her wit when conversing with nobles and her heart when dealing with the general populous of citizens, although, she was always sure to never let her emotions dictate her thoughts. Through, there was one small weakness in her style of ruling and living, keeping the two sides separate but capable of coexisting. You see, it was her country, where much of Celestia's pride came from; her nation's wealth, its security, her citizen's happiness and, of course, the balance she'd achieved in her system through many thousands of years of careful and delicate ruling, minus the odd war here and there. Or, in layman's terms, her Harmony.
The Harmony of Equestria was perhaps the most fickle aspect of Equestria of all, perhaps ironically, but Celestia had taken it upon herself to maintain it carefully. And for a very long time, she had succeeded. Be it through war or times of peace, when the economy boomed or went bust, Celestia had never failed to keep things under control, and that was because of the careful balance she had maintained. Celestia liked her balance. It gave her a sense of control she dearly needed when ruling her country properly. Some might even say she needed her balance, her control and Harmony.
Always waking up at the strike of five to prepare for the day. Raising the sun at the strike of six, depending on the season that is. Breakfast a half-six, sorting through the cases at day court by seven and attending said day court by nine, after two hours of deciding what needed be resolved when and handing the listing off to Elder Scroll for announcement. By twelve it was lunch, half-one any personal audiences that had been scheduled, any important meetings at four and in the dining hall eating dinner by six, maybe seven depending on the severity or importance of the meetings. By eight she had likely retired to her chambers to do as she pleased, by which time Luna would have taken over, leaving Celestia to do as she desired, looking forwards to her student's next letter for the most part.
There for, she was not very happy when something jeopardized that schedule. Nor was she particularly pleased that something was something that had been pestering her for a while now. And she was least pleased to discover it had been a death. Several in fact.
It had started three weeks ago. Out of the blue, in the most literal of senses. Tirek's short rampage had been brought to an abrupt halt by her faithful student, and everything was well. Then, a report had landed on her desk. She'd been going through reports of unicorns suffering bad headaches on a wide scale, but without them concentrated anywhere she couldn't send out an investigation team to look into it, so it had gone largely ignored. Celestia had considered sending Twilight out to look into it, but the newly realised Princess of Friendship had far too much on her hooves as it was, and Celestia didn't want to slow her down any. As she was skimming through the reports of migraines and abrupt nausea, she'd come across the CSI report. She hadn't even been aware that a CSI team had been dispatched, never mind that somepony had been killed.
Celestia's world had tripped when she'd read that word. Fatality. One death. Just the one. Ponies die every day of course, but they were all natural. It was a sad prospect for the immortal ruler, but an unavoidable one nonetheless. But for somepony to have died through unnatural causes troubled her greatly. One death could lead to two, two could lead to three and three to anarchy. Instability. Disharmony. Something she couldn't abide.
She'd quickly gone down to the Guardhouse where the single witness was being kept. She'd seen it all happen, right before her eyes. Celestia had asked simple questions, troubling this pony further or making her scared low on her list of priorities. But, the mare had been fine. She was barely in her twenties, just out of college and somepony had been killed right in front of her, and she hadn't been effected mentally in a single way. Celestia had even scanned her brain for any buried abnormalities, and nothing had come up. Then she'd asked why.
"Well, he was my ex-coltfriend. We'd broken up on bad terms, but my friends told me he never got over it. His brother told me he'd started drinking and getting into fights, but I'd moved out of town, back with my mother. I was out doing a few errands for her, and I took a shortcut through an ally. He was there, right as I got to a corner he appeared out of nowhere and I had a knife to my neck! He was nuts, or drunk or something, kept pleading with me to get back together, and if I said no… I don't even wanna think about it… But then, he just…fell down, a hole in his head with blood leaking out! All I remember was somepony saying 'psst', like when the want to get your attention when they're being quiet? He was dead before I could do anything, but right after I looked around for whatever it was that had done it, but I couldn't find it. Then I went for the guards, and here I am."
Inconclusive, if anything.
According to her records, the stallion had a history of both violence and sexual harassment. According to some of her detectives, what had happened had been the best case scenario. Apparently, a rape would have been was just around the corner.
After she'd questioned the mare, she'd gone down to the morgue to check out the body. Yet another curve-ball. His wound wasn't the result of a magical attack, quite the opposite. Instead, the post-mortem had revealed a single, piece of lead, imbedded in the stallion's brain, having pierced the side of the skull first before hitting the central nervous system. Instant death. Beyond that, there was nothing. Not even around the crime scene. Alongside the rain that night, the remote location and late hours, she and the forensic squad had gone home empty hooved.
And that was just the start of it.
Two days later, a similar report had come in, this one a flat-out mugging having been stopped. Here though, there was a difference. The stallion doing the mugging had been left alive. According to the witness, he'd had a similar day as the mare. Doing errands, shortcut down an ally and a stallion had leapt out of nowhere. But then, he'd apparently seen something behind him and gone galloping away. Next thing, as the witness had described it, 'a weird shape galloped past me. It looked like a diamond dog, only it was much more nimble, or-or a dragon, only it wasn't as big.' Again, inconclusive. There had been a short chase the victim hadn't seen, and according to the perp, the thing had used 'strange magic.' For example, they'd been galloping past a steam vent in a building, likely connected to a kitchen or something, and it had blown up right as it had galloped by, his pursuer pouncing on him and beating him senseless with a metal stick of some sort. He'd blacked out before he could remember any details.
The forensic team had examined the vent with a few engineers. The vent had been installed only recently, used to suck heavy steam out of a kitchen so it wasn't so unbearably hot, not to mention so the chiefs could see, and the steam reservoir had collapsed. The part of the vent that relied on magic to safely store its steam that couldn't be pumped out safely all at once, I.E the safety valve, had released all of its pent up steam at once and exploded right next to the stallion. Something had somehow released the enchantment on the valve and let it explode. The stallion had been lucky no shrapnel had hit him.
More of these reports had come in over the following days, more thugs and criminals being killed or subdued by a mystery figure. It was no coincident so much vigilantism was occurring in such a small time frame. This was the same pony, or whatever it was. The citizens had even given him or her a nickname; The Fox, after one witness had braved to go looking for him, following the dark shape into a dead-end alleyway only to find a single fox looking through an overturned dustbin. Celestia felt it fitted this vigilante well; a quiet sleuth, forever unnoticed until you went looking for them, and even then you rarely found them unless by accident.
But now, The Fox had taken it a step further. Nine ponies. Seven deaths, two knocked out and tied up, delivered to the guards on a silver platter. The seven deaths had been rather varied; a unicorn's horn had been blown up, for instance. Magical energies channelled into his horn, but it hadn't been given a release and had overloaded, blowing the Alicorn and most of his forehead off. Such a death was by no means suicide, it got too painful for the pony to keep it up that long. But that left and even more daunting question in its wake. The rest had been simpler; three had been thrown off the building they'd been hiding out on; two had been chocked to death with a straight, round object, likely a baton; and the last two had lead in their heads. The final two, the two that lived, were a strange case. Namely because these two were the leaders of the gang, a stallion and a mare running things in the middle of their marriage. Almost whimsical, if they hadn't been selling drugs and harassing the local businesses for protection money. Then, their operation had been shut down in one, fell swoop as some either hero or menace to society wiped them out in a single night. Their descriptions had been eerily similar to that of that of the saved victims. The mare had been looking over the town, her back to the rest of the roof. She'd heard a grunt and what could only be descried as the sounds of a beating, only to turn around to find a shape rushing towards her. Something had hit her head and the rest was history. And just like that, one of Canterlot's many small time gangs had been wiped out.
Of course, the side-effects had been much greater. Small time gang bosses were no longer quite so confident. If those two could be touched, touched hard, so could they. All of a sudden, these smaller gangs had called in a lot of their ponies, recalling dealers and thugs to protect their home interests. This Fox had done more in one night than Celestia and her guards had done in more than fifty years. He was slowly eradicating crime, single-hoofed, by taking dire measures and taking no prisoners.
That didn't change the fact that he was a part of that crime.
Vigilantism was a crime, no two ways about it. No matter how successful that vigilantly was. As such, a counsel had been called earlier that night to discuss as to what to do about all this. Letting him carry on had been a major trend, alongside hunting him down. Celestia didn't know what to think, herself; one the one hoof, this thing was protecting her citizens. Less crime meant more safety, and that meant everypony was happy. But he was also causing problems; her guards were beginning to be made to look like a laughingstock, a single unknown entity known only as a common canine vermin was doing a better job at cleaning the streets than they were, single hoofed.
Celestia massaged her temples gently, wishing she hadn't drank so much coffee earlier, but if she wanted to see this though she was going to have to pull an all-nighter. She had a simple choice to make as to how to act, given to her by her counsel: either let him continue, or stop him.
Well, that was a loose-loose right there. Stop him and criminals would regain their confidence, let him carry on and the guards would lose theirs. They'd also become complacent and lazy, as anypony would when they had nothing to do. This wasn't going to be an easy decision, hence the long hours.
A light fluttering disturbed Celestia's thinking, prompting her to look up from her work. Philomena was perched on her stand on the princess's desk, looking at her with a somewhat worried expression. The bird's appearance reminded Celestia she hadn't slept in over twenty-two hours. The princess of the day yawned, stretching her back and legs, before she looked at her phoenix again, resting her tired head on a hoof while the other fussed her bird's head.
"What do you think Philomena" she asked in a weary mumbled, her hoof gently stroking her bird's head. Philomena simply cooed quietly, her tone concerned. Celestia just gave a weak smile in agreement as she yawned into a hoof again. The sounds of a door opening and light invading her comfortable darkness disturbed Celestia's exhausted tranquillity for the second time in a minute. A silhouette cut through the yellow light, revealing a tall pony of dark colours, her wings folded by her side and her horn glowing slightly to light her way.
"Sister, you're still awake" Luna asked into the gloom. Celestia huffed a little in reply. "You know this is not good for you, big sister" the princess of the night continued as she trotted into the room. Celestia gave a small smile as she stood from behind her desk, meeting her sister as they embraced for a second before letting go.
"Forgive me, sister…my mind is occupied by this…"
"Disturbance" Luna posed for her.
"Yes, that would be an apt phrase" Celestia agreed. "I just can't get it out of my mind. It's almost like…its deliberately teasing me. So many problems have arisen in the last few weeks thanks to nothing more than a vigilante. Yet just enough good has been done to make this an impossible decision to make." Luna smiled slightly in agreement.
"Indeed. If only this Fox weren't so effective" she muttered as she guided her sister to her bed. "Nevertheless, a princess needs her beauty sleep, and you are far from beautiful right now" she told her big sister as she sat on the bed. Celestia gave another tired, if slightly insulted, smile.
"So I'm only pretty right now?" Luna giggled as her sister lay down, pulling the covers over herself.
"Of course. I heard from Manehatten only the other day that eye bags are the new eye shadow" she replied, electing a small laugh from her sister. As she wrapped herself in her duvet, Celestia listened to the sounds of Luna's hooves get further away from her bed. "Sleep tight Tia" she said over her shoulder before she closed the door. Celestia was fairly certain that she wouldn't.
Author's Note
Before you ask, no this is not what I've been faffing (heh) around with in between chapters of The Assassins's Song, this is just a little something-something I worked on a while back and never got back to. If it dose well here I might throw some more words at it.
Productive faffer out.
